Startups Archives - Page 55 of 144

Seattle Techstars Startup: SandGlaz Raises $500K

A Techstars Seattle startup graduate that specializes in collaborative project/task management has just announced a $500k raise. The startup, called SandGlaz, was founded in 2011.

SandGlaz makes it easy for high performance teams of 5-15 to manage and collaborate on tasks and projects which are managed in “infinite grids”. Users can break down task lists, add descriptions and set notifications and due dates. All this is managed through a drag and drop interface.

The funding round, led by private investors, will be used to launch more email integration, smartphone apps for Android and iOS, and launch a universal grid feature so that users can see all of their current tasks and projects on one screen.

There are already plenty of collaborative management tools out there already. Basecamp, Asana and even xtrant, offer teams of users the ability to manage tasks and projects together. However, SandGlaz CEO Nada Aldahleh, feels her startup serves the middle space between quick easy management solutions and more complex offerings like MS Project and SmartSheet.

SandGlaz seems to have all of the right things in the right places. Their revenue stream comes from their three tiered pricing plans. They offer a fermium model all the way up to team subscriptions. They also have their TechStars pedigree which definitely gives them a leg up in talking to investors.

Adlahleh spoke to BetaKit about their experience at TechStars:

“During our time at TechStars, we’ve been looking at how to improve our virality metric. I really think that virality is the key ingredient that every startup should be thinking about early on,” said Aldahleh.

Linkage

Check out SandGlaz here

Here’s more startup news from everywhere else

You need to be at the biggest startup conference in the U.S.

Tampa Bay Startup: MamaBear Giving Parents A Piece Of Mind

Monitoring your kids on the internet and on their mobile phone can be a sticky issue. Every parent wants to know that their children are being safe and that they are safe, everywhere they go and no matter what they are doing. Parents in this day and age have a lot more to watch out for than even 10 years ago. Child predators, cyber-bullying, texting and driving are all real problems facing parents and kids but privacy can be almost as sensitive.

Tampa Bay startup MamaBear has come up a mobile app that allows parents to monitor as much or as little as they want to on their child’s mobile phone. The first step though is the acknowledgement the app gets from the monitored phone (the child’s). Parents download the MamaBear app to their smartphone and then on their child’s phone. The child then checks in, both acknowledging the app is on their phone and letting their parents know where they are.

MamaBear from Mamabear App on Vimeo.

Parents can monitor locations, texts, social media, and more. In fact, MamaBear app also provides a list of words that could indicate the child is doing something that’s at risk or that they’re being cyber bullied.

MamaBear evolved out of a location based company that was working on providing businesses with location based business intelligence. One of the co-founders, Stuart Kime got into a conversation with a parent who had told him that her full time job was monitoring her kids’ social media pages. Kime along with his co-founders were able to come up with an app that gave parents a piece of mind all the way around.

We got a chance to interview Robyn Spoto, co-founder and company President. Check out the interview with her below:

Iowa Startup BidOnMyJob Harnesses SMS To Take On Craigslist

A new Iowa Startup called BidOnMyJob is ready to talk on the likes of Craigslist and AngiesList. The startup, founded by Derrick Hans and Nathan Gibson takes the, gigs and service offered sections out of Craigslist and has made a targeted platform for job matching, social discovery, and referrals.

The concept behind BidOnMyJob is that there are contractors and people who can do work for other folks just about anywhere.

” You have a huge network out there at your fingertips. Chances are there is someone that knows someone who can and wants to fix it for you” Hans said.

Contractors, workers and neighborhood handymen can sign up for an account at BidOnMyJob. From there, when there is a job posted that meets their criteria they will be alerted through the website and via text message.

We talked to Bruce Matheson, a carpenter and contractor in Maryland who said that the SMS integration would give BidOnMyJob a leg up on competitive sites he already uses for jobs. “I can only check Craigslist and Angie’s List in the morning before I go out for a Job and then at lunch. The jobs are gone by then. Having a system that texts me jobs would keep me more competitive.”

In addition to SMS alerts BidOnMyJob has a great social component that allows every job to easily be shared across multiple social networks like Twitter and Facebook, by email or even by text message.

Hans and Gibson have launched the company in the Des Moines metro area and will stay local for now, but do plan on a nationwide roll out.

Linkage:

Check out BidOnMyJob here

Here are more startup stories from Everywhere else.

This startup conference is the biggest startup conference in the country. Sign up now.

Israeli Startup: tawkon Is Like A Geiger Counter For Your Smart Phone

Depending on who you talk to the verdict on the radiation generated from cell phones is still out. However it is a legitimate concern to many. An Israeli startup called tawkon wants to help smartphone users be aware when radiation levels emitted from their smartphone, become troublesome.

tawkon insists they aren’t trying to make people afraid of using their phones, in fact they tell us it’s quite the opposite.

“The goal of tawkon is not to have people fear using their phones, quite the opposite. In fact, 90% of the time phones are operating at low radiation, but the level of exposure someone gets from a phone at high radiation for one minute is the same as they would get for five hours at low radiation. It’s that 10% that we want to help you avoid.

When radiation levels from your phone spike tawkon will alert you and provide you with suggestions on how to lessen your exposure (such as using a headset or speakerphone). The app tracks your weekly radiation exposure and gives you valuable data on how many minutes of “high radiation” you have been exposed to.” Mark Lerner, New Media & Marketing Manager for Tawkon told us in an interview.

tawkon wants to give their users piece of mind to be able to use their smartphones whenever they want, knowing that if the radiation emitted from their phones ever becomes a concern Tawkon will alert them.

We got a chance to interview Lerner in depth about Tawkon check out the interview below.

Temecula California Startup: Sightly Inks $5.6M In Venture Round

Sightly, a startup based in Temecula California has just announced a venture raise of $5.6 million dollars. The company specializes in connecting and engaging local businesses with customers through video.

The companies innovative platform utilizes video across the web and where it matters most in this decade, on their mobile device. Sightly helps businesses develop and manage interactive video campaigns through a real time dashboard that allows businesses to monitor their own success.

The company started out as a business focused video production company however John McIntyre the founder and CEO of Sightly has abandoned the production house business for the current model where the opportunity really exists.

Moscow based Bright Capital Digital also sees the great opportunity with Sightly. They led this $5.6 million dollar round. The company also attracted new investor Foresight Ventures.

Existing investors, Floodgate, Tomorrow Ventures, Bullpen Capital, Mack Capital and 500 Startups also participated in the round.

“We believe that video – particularly on mobile devices – is going to drive how consumers find and choose local businesses,” McIntyre said “This funding from both new and current investors not only validates this vision but supports its realization.”

“Local is exploding,” said Mike Maples of Floodgate. “Sightly not only has a compelling vision of where the market is heading for consumers and local businesses, but they have a breakthrough approach on how to make that vision a reality and create a game changer in local advertising.”

Linkage:

Check out Sightly here

More startup news from everywhere else.

everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference is the biggest startup conference in the U.S.

New Hampshire Social Entrepreneurs Launch LocalCoaster

We’ve seen an explosion of social entrepreneurship represented by some great out of the box startup ideas. Back in November we brought you an interview with Utah Startup HeadCase, which is attacking poverty with headphones. We also recently wrote about Los Angeles startup Upperatus, using unique monthly designed t-shirts and donating $11 per shirt to a monthly charity.

Now, New Hampshire startup LocalCoaster is using coasters in bars and restaurants as a socially driven advertising vehicle. The startup, founded by Whit Whitman, Jim Thompson, Susan Wiley and Matt Burke are using both sides of a coaster to engage customers, get them local deals and give to charity.

The company is attracting local businesses and corporate sponsors to advertise on the coasters.

NPR describes the process like this:

One side of the coaster is sold to a local advertiser, for example RiverRun Bookstore. On the other side the advertising will be sold to larger corporations like Holloway Automotive .

The coasters will be distributed free to local restaurants and bars. The advertisers and partnered restaurants will get to vote for their favorite charities. The charity selected will receive the first $5000 of the as revenue.

The startup received there first shipment of 110,000 coasters at the beginning of the month. They’ve signed up 11 local businesses and 1 corporate advertiser to date. They are optimistic about LocalCoaster. They also have 16 local and regional charities on board.

They plan on expanding outside of Portsmouth shortly. In February they will open up shop in Portland Maine. Burlington Vermont and Conway New Hampshire are already listed on the companies website.

Linkage:

Check out LocalCoaster here

Check out these other startups from “everywhere else”

everywhereelse.co is the largest startup conference in the U.S.

Startup Weekend To Ring Opening Bell Friday

Startup Weekend was founded in Boulder Colorado in 2007, by Andrew Hyde. What we now know as the 54 hour hackathon style, team startup weekend event started out with a different model. When Hyde created Startup Weekend the goal was to bring a group together to work on one idea or concept all weekend.

That model evolved into what we know today as Startup Weekend and the thousands of clones out there. In 2009 Marc Nager and Clint Nelsen acquired Startup Weekend and made it an official 501c3 non-profit organization.

The following year they received major backing from the Kauffman Foundation.

Today Startup weekend has hosted events across 100 countries and 400 cities. Startup Weekend events are serious business for their hacker, entrepreneur and founder participants. In fact missile attacks couldn’t even thwart this Israeli Startup Weekend (at first).

Startup Weekend has also hosted global contests pitting participants in several cities and countries against each other. The Global Startup Battle is in its second year and took place last month as part of Global Entrepreneurship Week. Mega Startup Weekend is also another event that highlights the collective efforts of entrepreneurs at Startup Weekend events.

Startup Weekend will celebrate the creation of 100,000 entrepreneurs in their 3 years of existence in the current format. To mark the occasion Nager and Nelsen will ring the opening bell on the New York Stock Exchange on Friday morning.

According to GeekWire Startup Weekend has raised $75 million dollars for entrepreneurship and created thousands of jobs.

Linkage

Startup Weekend can be found here

Here’s nibletz coverage of Startup Weekend

Check out this giant startup event

500Startups Backs Bangalore Startup ZipDial

Dave McClure and his 500startups continue their jaunt across the globe. Just last week we reported that McClure had made his first investment in a German startup. Today we’ve found out that 500startups has backed a company out of Bangalore India called ZipDial.

500startups is no stranger to Indian startups. In fact, an Indian email newsletter startup called TradeBriefs is in the current cohort based 500startups accelerator program, happening right now in Mountain View.

ZipDial founded by Sanjay Swamy, Amiya Pathak and Valerie Rozycki is a mobile marketing engagement platform that works based on a missed call. A call is initiated and then disconnects after one ring and then sends a text message.

“We’ve been impressed at how effective ZipDial has been for us, usually 2-5 times more effective than Facebook or just SMS. We see its value for brand and SME advertiser clients and are excited to see it grow globally,” Satyan Gajwani, CEO, Times Internet (who participated in the funding round along with 500Startups) told SiliconIndia

“500 Startups has proven repeatedly to add value with its global network of mentors helping their portfolio companies grow. Working with the fund is strategic for ZipDial as we invest in our international expansion into other emerging markets,” says Valerie R. Wagoner, CEO and Founder of ZipDial, as reported by Silicon India

Linkage:
ZipDial is on the web here.

More startup news from everywhere else.

everywhereelse.co is the largest startup conference in the U.S.

Miami Getting A Health Tech Startup Accelerator

Health tech is a huge space. It, along with its sibling, “bioscience” is one of the fastest growing segments of startups world wide. Health tech focused accelerators can be wildly successful, especially “everywhere else”.

In startup communities “everywhere else” it can be easier for investors to understand health tech, as opposed to the latest, greatest, social local mobile event discovery app. Presumably, health tech startups have a direct path to helping people, fighting sickness or driving costs down.

Lift1428, an innovation design, strategy and communications firm, the Miami Innovation Center at the University of Miami Life Science & Technology Park and its developer, Wexford Science + Technology, and the UM Miller School of Medicine, have teamed up for Project Lift Miami, a new health tech focused startup accelerator in Miami, reports the Miami Herald.

The new Project Lift Miami accelerator is a 100 day program for new startups and entrepreneurs. They will select between 10-15 startups and entrepreneurs to participate in the program. Each startup will receive between $20,000 and $30,000 in seed funding.

However, like most accelerators, this program is not about the funding. All of the teams will have access to a nationwide network of top level mentors who have committed to the startups well beyond the 100 day program.
“There’s so much regulation and there are privacy issues and other barriers to entry that are different in the healthcare industry. Having the access to the environment we have here to test your idea and prove your concept is a great advance,” said Robert Chavez, Executive Director of Project Lift, who is also executive director of business intelligence at UM’s Miller School, told the Herald “That kind of mentoring you won’t get at a general accelerator.”

Linkage:
Apply now for Project Lift

More startup news is here

See a bunch of Miami Startups at the largest startup conference in the U.S.

Everywhereelse.co Getting Close, Less Than 8 Weeks Til The Biggest Startup Conference In The U.S.

The biggest startup conference in the United States, everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference, is happening in less than eight weeks. February 9-12th 2013, over 1700 entrepreneurs, startup founders, investors, designers, and developers will converge on downtown Memphis Tennessee. Make no mistake about it, this is a national conference with less than 15% of the ticket sales zipcoding to Tennessee.

Over 400 of the tickets sold have identified themselves as angels or VC’s and their email addresses check out.

The conference officially starts on Sunday February 10th with a preview of the Startup Village. Over 100 startups from around the world will be exhibiting in the Startup Village. Startup Village exhibitors have three changes to win part of $50,000 in cash (and then prizes) in three different contests. The first contest will be a video contest that will launch on January 15th and is open to all of the startups in the village. The second contest will be a hard 2 minute speed pitch contest in front of an audience of investors Sunday afternoon. The third contest is an audience choice contest which will allow the over 1700 attendees who’ve purchased tickets to the event to vote for the startup they like the best.

We have the strongest speaker line up of any conference this size. Scott Case, founding CTO at Priceline.com, Several TechStars founders, Mike Bott GM at The Brandery, Gabe Lozano from Lockerdome, Sarah Ware, Award Winning Author Tracy Myers, and many more that we can announce when ticket sales close.

everywhereelse.co The Starutp Conference will give startups, entrepreneurs and founders unparalleled access to some of the best investors in the world and networking opportunities not available from any other conference. We’ve been able to do this because of our great sponsors and keeping ticket prices low. (Regular price $99 attendee $550 startup/early bird pricing $59 attendee $425 startup which includes 3 tickets)

We can’t wait to see you in Memphis!

Linkage:

everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference website

Get your Startup Village booth or attendee ticket here

Barcelona Startup: Groupiest, Create Your Own Social Networks

When you scale down social networks to their core, you’ll quickly realize that they’ve been around a lot longer than Facebook. MMC groups on AOL, bulletin boards on Prodigy and even dial in BBS’ back in the 80’s would equate to what has evolved into the current social network. Albeit today’s social networks have many more features, users and points of entry.

While Facebook continues to grow, and currently tops over 1 billion users, siloed or vertical social networks are starting to pop up all over the place. You have your one big public network and than you have your “clubs”. So what if there is no network for your interest yet? You could opt to be entrepreneurial and create a startup for it, with a practical likeliness of failing. Or you can find a startup that lets you create your own mini social networks.

That platform is Barcelona startup Groupiest.

Groupiest allows users to create their own community of interest for free (read mini-social network). Using Groupiest users can share what their passionate about and build their own personal brand in their own network of like minded folks. Think Yahoo Groups or even Usenet on steroids.

We got a chance to talk with the founders of Groupiest. Check out the interview below:

Merry Christmas Instagram: Facebook’s Mobile Photo App Hit With Class Action Lawsuit

While millions of people across the world were preparing for Christmas and undoubtedly filling their Instagram feeds with pictures of carolers, cooking, food, presents and of course Santa Claus, A woman from San Diego, Lucy Funes, and the law firm of Finklestein & Krinsk launched a class action lawsuit against the photo giant.

Instagram quickly found themselves under fire from irate users. Even some of their more infamous users like Kim Kardashian said they would quit using the service. National Geographic had taken down their Instagram feed. All of this stemming from a change in Instagram’s Terms of Service (TOS). You know those long legaleeze pages that you just automatically agree to so that you can start using an app.

In the originally changed TOS Instagram had basically said that they could use your photos for whatever they want without compensation. They also said they may choose to advertise alongside your photos, they didn’t have to tell you and you wouldn’t make any money from it. Of course, whether or not you agree with these terms, no one forces you to use their product. All the while, if you do, you’re making an agreement to abide by their terms.

Nevertheless, Instagram founder and CEO Kevin Systrom went ahead and back pedaled on the parts pertaining to copyright and using a users photos. The language about advertising remained in place.

Funes, most likely started the ball rolling for her class action lawsuit before Systrom apologized and changed the terms of service again, however the suit was filed. The lawsuit says customers who don’t agree with Instagram’s terms can cancel their profile but forfeit the rights to photos they previously shared on the service.

“In short, Instagram declares that ‘possession is nine-tenths of the law and if you don’t like it, you can’t stop us,'” the lawsuit says.

Instagram catapulted to fame over the last few years. They were acquired by Facebook in early 2012 for what was believed to be a cash/stock deal worth $1 billion dollars at the time it was announced. Because of Facebook’s decline in stock valuation the deal is only worth about $715 million dollars now.

With the long holiday weekend it’s hard to tell if Funes will still push forward with the lawsuit since the new TOS language doesn’t lay claim to a users photos the way it previously did. We’ll hopefully find out more shortly.

The holidays are a big time for Instagram. They may see a little downtrend this year partially caused by users unsure of what’s happening with the Terms of Service and also because their sharing via Twitter went through a major overhaul earlier this month.

Linkage:

Source: Yahoo/Reuters

More startup news from “everywhere else”

Did you know everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference is the largest startup conference in the U.S.

Partnership With St. Louis Rams, Paying Off For Startup, Bonfyre

St. Louis startup Bonfyre is socially engaging and powering events in ways that other social event sharing apps just haven’t been able to perfect. When you think about an actual bonfire, you know the big huge ones, everyone at the bonfire may take away something different from that event. If you’ve ever been to enormous bonfires like the ones at Bonaroo in years past, hundreds and hundreds of people could be at the same event and share totally different experiences.

The same thing goes for any large event. Football games make a great case use for the Bonfyre application. Here you have tens of thousands of fans that are watching the same game, with different favorite players, different favorite teams, and in different places throughout the stadium. In this day and age all of those people are sharing to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other social networks. Everyone has a different perspective and different shares. Bonfyre is bringing that all back together.

The St. Louis, venture backed startup was founded by Raymond Gobberg and Mark Sawyier. They’ve received $750,000 in venture capital from Arch Angels and Cultivation Capital. It’s another St. Louis startup that Rick Holton is all fyred up about.

Bonfyre was fortunate enough to get into a partnership with the St. Louis Rams early on. Now Bonfyre and the Rams have been through their third sponsored game. The St. Louis Business Journal, is reporting that during the game between the St. Louis Rams and the Minnesota Vikings, fans used Bonfyre over 17,000 times. 20 percent of those participants shared 1800 chats and photos.

The Rams are taking advantage of Bonfyre’s social network and outreach and they’ve baked ticket giveaways and behind the scenes photos and chats with players into the game experience via Bonfyre.

“The app allows us to further connect with our fans to help increase the value of their experience before, during and after a game,” Brian Killingsworth Rams Vice President of Marketing & Branding for the Rams told the Business Journal.

Linkage:

Check out Bonfyre here

Here’s more startup news from “everywhere else”

everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference is the largest startup conference in the U.S.

Atlanta Startup: CloudSherpas Announces $40 Million Dollar Raise

CloudSherpas, an Atlanta based startup has announced a VC raise of $40 million dollars as well as an acquisition of CloudTrigger, a consulting company that specializes in Salesforce.

TechCrunch describes CloudSherpas as a “cloud brokerage”. The company is a reseller of Google Apps and services as well as Salesforce products. They also consult on everything cloud.

But their own intellectual property also puts them in a category by themselves. CloudSherpas has a treasure trove of their own proprietary extensions as well as those stemming from their acquisitions.

TechCrunch is quick to point out that CloudSherpas is themselves a product of a merger. Back in March they merged with New York company GlobalOne. At that time they received a $20 million dollar investment from Columbia Capital, who had previously invested $15 million in GlobalOne.

This $40 million dollar round was led by GreenSpring Associates and brought their total vc funding to $62.6 million. Columbia Capital and Delta-V Capital joined in the new round. Australia-based Queensland Investment Corporation, an institutional investment manager, also participated.

CloudSherpas reportedly employs 350 people and plans to have a head count of 500 in the coming year.

Linkage:

Find CloudSherpas on the web here

Source: TC

Click here for everywhereelse.co the largest startup conference in the US